Scaling a Customer Success Team

This is one of the top questions I get about Customer Success! When breaking down responsibilities I try to consider what the best experience for the customer will be and ensure I align the responsibi

In my opinion, this really depends on your internal org structure and who owns renewal and growth. But, if I could design something from scratch and do it at any company, it would mirror exactly what

It's important for Customer Success and Sales to share incentives around customer growth. Too often folks think about customer retention and customer growth as two mutually exclusive things. The fac

I dont' disagree with this structure, but would argue that if CS is not also driving net-new revenue (and compensated accordingly), you will always have a Finance team who annually asks the question:

Relationships with your customer are key to understanding what success means for them. You can not believe that only one department or just one person is getting value from your product. So you need

Been there, done that! IMO, it’s pretty simple – start with who is screaming the loudest and why. Take what they are frustrated about, ask them to prioritize their needs, and then see about knocking t

Here's a framework you can use to help prioritize: Assess the current state of customer success: Before you can prioritize needs and deliverables, you need to assess the current state of customer suc

I’ve been at Eightfold for just over 2 years now, moving over to customer success from a 20+ year career in Talent Acquisition, so remember that my experience is unique vs. a traditional CS career pat

In my experience, if an organization is just starting out with CS, it's best to first be very nimble because pretty much anything goes at that point. But, it's super important to design a framework b

Scaling a customer success team beyond the first customer success manager requires careful planning and execution to ensure that the team can handle the increased workload while maintaining high custo

The best customer success candidates: • Communication skills: The ability to communicate with customers and all stakeholders clearly and effectively. • Customer-centric mindset: The ability to put on

I find the best CSMs are: Curious - they want to understand “why”. This translates well with customers as it means they have an innate desire to understand their business. It also means that they are

Customer Success is different in every organization. Some companies see CS as product experts or an extension of Support. I see Customer Success as Consultants and Change Agents and so I hire for the

The best candidates can relate their experience to how they will be successful in the role. They will have thought about scenario-based questions and be ready to describe how they have tackled specifi

The intangibles: assertiveness, strong sense of ownership, business acumen, very strong communication at the exec level, soft-sales experience, technical acumen (at a high level),  All of these are

I love when the candidate is smiling and have friendly energy. That tells me if he/she is making me feel comfortable, it is highly probable that he/she will do the same with the customers. These are

Firstly, good choice! You have picked a hot career and I only see CS becoming more prominent and important over the next decade. Be curious. Take time to understand your customer’s business - one of

It can seem daunting jumping into a customer-facing role. Where do I start if I don’t have the relationships built yet? How do I make connections to successfully drive business for my company? At the

Listen!! Join every possible meeting, especially with the product team. Meet with sales an marketin, it is important to know and understand what they are selling to your clients and how to align and

We have our Customer Success organization broken into 2 groups - Strategic Customer Success and Scaled Customer Success. In the Strategic Customer Success group I have managers who are responsible fo

We have a leader over post-sale who rolls into our Chief Revenue Officer. We call this org Customer Value and Adoption. Within this umbrella, we have Support, Services, and Customer Success. Within

Community as an extension of advocacy KPIs. Typical customer advocacy is a flywheel for new business, case studies, sales references, etc. And of course, that’s important, but I think customer success

Not all customer success activities should be treated alike. There are some very high-value customer engagement activities that should be completed with your accounts. For example: executive engage

This is a tough one. I generally view these as “lite sales cycle” which it sounds like you do as well. If the account is large enough - a multi-level engagement strategy extending 1-2 management layer

When it comes to maintaining positive relationships with customers – especially if your champion has changed and you need to restate your value proposition – I always think about three things as relat

One of the most important responsibilities of CS is to ensure that we are sharing the stories and insights we hear from our customers with the rest of the business. To do this, I like to hold monthly